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The Embassy of Colombia in Berlin

Contact

Address: Kurfürstenstrasse 84, 10787 Berlin, Germany

Tel.: (+49) 30 26 39 61 0

Fax: (+49) 30 26 39 61 25

E-mail: eberlin@cancilleria.gov.co

www.embajada-colombia.de

The Ambassador

Amb. Felipe Buitrago

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Amb. Felipe Buitrago was born in 1976, and has been serving as the Ambassador of Columbia to Germany since May 5th 2022.
Buitrago has an undergraduate degree in Economics from the Los Andes University of Colombia, with special focus on the history of Middle East, Europe and Russia. He holds a Master’s degree in International Public Policy from the Johns Hopkins University SAIS, where he specialized in conflict management and strategic studies.
Ambassador Felipe Buitrago has over 20 years of experience in the cultural and ICT sectors, having been involved in the design, implementation and evaluation of policies that aim to develop creative entrepreneurship and appropriation of new technologies. He has held the following positions: Minister of Culture of Colombia; Vice-Minister of Creativity and Orange Economy (Creative Industries); Presidential Advisor on Economic and Strategic Affairs; Director of the “TicTac”, think tank of the Colombian Chamber of Informatics and Telecommunications; Consultant to the Division of Culture, Solidarity and Creativity of the Inter-American Development Bank; Director of the Ibero-American Copyright Observatory; and Developing Creative Economies Programme Manager at the British Council in the UK.
He has also been involved in numerous studies worldwide and has published several articles on the cultural and creative industries (CCIs), as well as on information and communication technologies (ICTs), establishing him as a national and international authority on the creative industries and the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

History

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Germany and Colombia have enjoyed long and friendly relations due to the German businesses operating in Colombia, the scientific and academic exchange, as well as cultural institutions and development cooperation. The last visit to Colombia is by Federal Foreign Minister Steinmeier in 2015, whereas the most recent visit to Germany by Colombian President Santos was in November 2014. Germany is Colombia’s principal trading partner in the European Union, and there has been a marked growth in bilateral trade in recent years. A number of major German companies have their own production facilities in Colombia.

German development cooperation with Colombia focuses on peace development and crisis prevention as well as environmental protection and resource conservation. A third priority area, sustainable economic development, was added in 2012. As for the academic relations, they are close, as is evidenced by the approximately 2600 Colombians studying at German universities, by university partnerships, exchanges of researches and lectures and cooperation under scholarship programmes. On the other hand, there is a growing number of German academics and researchers working at universities and research institutions in Colombia. Finally, the Goethe Institute offers an extensive cultural programme and numerous language courses.